Until 15 November, there will be around 80 opportunities from Kiel to Böblingen to get advice and tests. This year, a particularly large number of offers are available directly in the gay scene, for example in the sauna
The night in the Deutsche Eiche can begin: The man at the entrance pushes everything you need for a relaxing evening of cruising over the counter: towel, cloakroom key, condom packet. And a leaflet announcing a special service from the Munich AIDS service organisation: HIV testing in the sauna today.
Rather unusual? Not during the ICH WEISS WAS ICH TU test weeks. They are running throughout Germany until 15 November. In cooperation with numerous local project partners, IWWIT is offering tests for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections at many locations - including the appropriate counselling, of course. There are still around 80 opportunities until next Monday.
The testing weeks are intended to motivate people to get tested and receive counselling, because a good quarter of people with HIV in Germany are unaware of their infection. Many therefore miss the optimal time to start treatment.
Counselling in separate rooms: discretion is important
In order to address the target group directly, counselling and tests are not only carried out in familiar places such as health authorities or local AIDS service centres, but increasingly also in saunas, in front of trendy bars and in the run-up to parties - anywhere where men who like to have sex with other men meet.
"On-site testing is not possible everywhere," says Christopher Knoll from the Munich AIDS service organisation. "But if the premises are right and the owners go along with it, such an offer makes a lot of sense." Knoll's team set up in the traditional gay sauna of the Hotel Deutsche Eiche for the first time this year.
"Of course, we didn't aggressively recruit people," emphasises Knoll. Instead, guests could turn to an AIDS-Hilfe stand if they were interested. Counselling took place in two separate rooms that were not visible from the sauna or the waiting area. This discretion is very important to Knoll: "If there had been a positive test result, the person seeking counselling could even have left the sauna through a second entrance."
Test week coordinator Peter Wiessner welcomes the on-site activities: "We are delighted that more initiatives are daring to come out in 2010. Without the imagination of the participating projects, the many offers would not have been possible."
The low-threshold counselling services in the scene are intended to reach men who take risks during sex but have perhaps never taken a test or been to a counselling session. Some find it difficult to go to the AIDS service organisation or health authority.
Scientists at the Free University of Berlin are investigating whether this target group is actually being reached. The test weeks in 2009 did not yet allow a clear statement to be made here: during the on-site visits, a relatively large number of men were tested who, according to their own statements, had not previously taken any risk of HIV transmission - i.e. who did not belong to the target group mentioned. It is also possible that some participants acted according to the motto: The HIV test in the sauna saves the trip to the AIDS service organisation.
Hot sauna, cool head?
The evaluation of the 2010 test weeks is also eagerly awaited because the on-site tests are controversial. Critics believe that a sauna or a party is simply not the right place to make a medical diagnosis.
Peter Wiessner is aware of the concerns, but believes that good counselling on HIV and AIDS is also possible in venues with a gay scene. The quality standards for HIV testing developed by Deutsche AIDS-Hilfe are in no way jeopardised when used in the gay scene: "The hygiene regulations and counselling standards are of course observed at night in a sauna just as they are during the day in AIDS service centres or health authorities," Wiessner emphasises.
The counselling sessions take place in a protected environment, their content is treated confidentially and the person seeking advice remains anonymous. An HIV test is only carried out if the person being tested agrees and knows what they are agreeing to. This also includes the principle: no testing under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
And yet: could it happen that someone decides to take a test in the party life that they later regret?
"If the setting is right, nobody will be taken by surprise by a test offer in the scene," says Reinhard Klenke from AIDS-Hilfe NRW - and gives the following example the "Counselling and Test Mobile", which is in use in North Rhine-Westphalia. Inside the camper van, you can even have a quiet consultation in a motorway car park. "A test offer in a bus like this leaves it up to everyone to decide whether to take the test or not."
